Episode Links

Abridged Transcript

Kelly
Kelly: For the listeners out there, can you talk a little bit about Orange Element? What makes you guys stand out from others in the business, what type of client you take on and what’s the typical work that you take on? I know that’s kind of a lot; let’s just kind of start with can you talk a little bit about Orange Element as a company?
Megan
It’s all you: my first day was yesterday!
Kendall
True. So, for some context, I worked here for two years and I also interned my senior year of school and since I’ve been working here we’ve definitely gone through a really big transformation. I feel like everyone kinda looks at design and originally you kind of go into it where it’s like, I want to do print design or I want to do branding or I want to do web design and the nice thing that’s about…the nice thing about agencies is that you kind of can get everything. So Orange Element, there’s really not like a certain market or kind of client that we look for to work with; it’s kind of just we see what’s out there, we get referred by past clients that we work with or current clients and it’s really just all different kinds of projects so we’ll do anything from designing a new website to re-branding a company that eventually leads to websites or publications or magazines so I feel like I’m kind of just talking about nothing at this point, so it’s kind of really just whatever comes our way, really; we don’t have a specific niche that we look for as far as clients and the kind of work that we do.
Kelly
Kelly: So it’s kind of full service is what you’re saying?
Kendall
Yeah, like, one thing that’s really cool about working here is that I’ve noticed is that if we aren’t necessarily experts in a field, we don’t pretend like we are but we know that we have the ability to learn and it’s a very fast-paced environment so if there’s a kind of project where Aaron or Nicolette or someone will be like, Kendall, we need you to figure out how to code this HTML5 banner and it’s like, I don’t have experience as a developer or coder but I’m like, I can figure out how to do it and that’s something that’s been really cool about working here is that you’re kind of forced to learn but it’s also like a super-helpful thing because it’s the next time it comes around, we’ll feel more confident in taking on projects because we know that we’ve learned in the past and we could accomplish the goal of the project, so…did I answer the question at all?
Kelly
Kelly: How do you like, if you don’t know something, how do you communicate that to who you’re working for? Like not within the company, I mean the company that you’re…
Kendall
So, it’s kind of a little bit of…I don’t know how to explain this in an appropriate way. So you know how, this might not be appropriate. So, you know how in school, you kinda have to BS a little bit?
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah!
Kendall
Not saying that we do that with clients because obviously it’s a more professional environment, but it’s kind of like…you sell it in a way where…
Kelly
Like if you know you can figure it out? You kind of…
Kendall
Yeah, you sell it in a way where you’re not necessarily an expert in it but you’re like, oh yeah, we can totally get that done; we have a lot of partners that we work with so like on one of our websites in things that require like, coding or in development or anything like that, we’ll say, oh, we have partners that we work with on a regular basis to get these things done.
Just if you think about like in a job interview you’re kind of selling yourself so if there’s like, I mean if there’s a skill that you know that you can’t pick up or that you just don’t have, you’re not going to lie and say that you do, but if it’s something that’s like you know is within your reach, you kind of like sell yourself a little bit because you’re trying to like, build…
Kelly
Kelly: You can do it.
Megan
Right, exactly. You know that you can get yourself there and you’re trying to, you know, make a sale, build a relationship.
Kendall
That’s way better than what I was…that makes a lot of sense.
Kelly
Kelly: So you say it in a way that doesn’t diminish the…confidence?
Megan
Right, you want to be confident but you don’t want to commit yourself to something that you aren’t sure you can accomplish.
Kendall
And the thing that’s nice about our industry, like I was saying, like there are partners and that’s not like…that’s not an uncommon thing to have happen, like it’s something that’s…
Megan
A developer or an illustrator or something like that because, especially somewhere like this that is pretty small, you can’t do literally everything, so I think that that is pretty standard, to have those connections.
Kelly
Kelly: Now, other job titles and positions besides just a basic designer that are available to those with a design background that might not be very common to students, because normally when we’re at School we think, OK, I’m going to be a graphic designer, but like what is that? What job titles are really, like, out there? Maybe something along like conceptualization or strategy?
Megan
I’ve definitely seen a lot of Graphic Designer, I mean as, especially coming off of a recent job search, but one of the other ones that I was coming across a lot is Product Designer, and to me that would mean like, industrial design and products but actually what they’re talking about is interfaces and applications, so when these product design listings, their job descriptions are asking for people who are going to develop apps and do the interfaces for mobile, so that’s one that kind of I think is related to Graphic Design that I’ve seen a lot. Have you seen other stuff?
Kendall
I think what you’ll see is you’ll see a lot of Graphic Designer but then it depends on the company that it’s for, like, you have to read more into it and see what the responsibilities and the roles are, because some…it could all be Graphic Design for five different jobs but you would be doing completely different things at each job, like, some you would only be doing magazines for them or some you would only be working on their web design team, so I think Graphic Designer really is a broad term and then it’s kind of just based on the roles and responsibilities of each company.
Kelly
Kelly: So you can kind of, you can be more specific to one role or it might fall under multiple categories that you might be responsible for?
Megan
I think it also, like Kendall was saying, kind of depends on the company and if it’s a company of Designers, they might be more specific and like say, Product Designer or kind of narrow in on that niche but if it’s in-house for someone or if it’s like, I don’t know, people who aren’t designers and speaking design language, you’re probably going to find Graphic Designer or even just Designer and then the job description is going to tell you all that stuff; basically what Kendall just said.
Kelly
Kelly: I was thinking also along the lines of like, how we were talking about earlier was branding and that sort of marketing strategy. Is that just kind of also part of the Graphic Designer’s job, typically here at Orange Element or is there someone kind of specifically in that role?
Kendall
So, as far as marketing strategy, that’s kind of its own thing because marketing in my opinion is a completely different thing from the actual design process, so if it’s anything that’s strategy based, there are strategists, but I think that’s a completely different degree and field of study. As far as branding, I think, like we were saying, it kind of goes along with whatever company that you’re working for. Like, if you’re working in-house, you’re not necessarily going to be responsible for branding because you’re already working within a brand of an established company. A cool thing about working at an agency is that we can bring…we can work with companies to brand them and that’s something that wouldn’t necessarily be offered at an in-house opportunity.
Megan
Yeah, I mean, I don’t know, in my mind, marketing and branding aren’t two totally separate processes because if you’re going to go back to the very beginning of branding a company or looking at things like their audience and what their goals are and maybe how you’re appealing to their audience and these types of…there’s a little bit of strategy that would go into creating a brand and what that personality is and that will inform the esthetic, but those are…the strategy process on a branding level I think happens first.
But then on a day to day, if you’re not kind of like going in this all-encompassing brand endeavor, the marketing strategy kind of happens on one side and the design things kind of happen on the other side but I think strategy is kind of always informing the design. It’s also interesting because I feel like people, when you think about a studio like this and even from a client’s perspective they think branding is the main thing that you do all day every day but I feel like that’s really not the case: there’s so much more work to be done for clients within their existing brands once they already have them.
Kendall
Yeah, I feel like something that happens a lot too is that clients will come to you with a brand and they’re like, how can we refresh this brand to make it feel more modern, so they’re kind of attached to maybe their logo, or to their brand colors or something; they don’t want to completely change their brand but with how the market is changing so rapidly nowadays and there’s so many different design trends companies are trying to figure out, how can I keep my original brand but also push it into something that feels like it’s current and modern; I feel like that happens way more often than…we don’t have any logo, we have nothing…
Megan
We’re brand new…coming up for the first thing.
Kendall
Especially too because a lot of start-up companies don’t have a lot of money so a lot of the time they’ll go to…like their freelance college student or something and they’ll be like, we need a logo.
Megan
Or their mom’s neighbor’s daughter…
Kendall
Yeah, so there’s a lot of that, that goes around too so you’re kind of working with that sometimes, so…it can be a process.
Kelly
Kelly: Now, for the design projects that you work with clients, what’s the average kind of turnaround time for those from start, when you’re meeting the client, to the finished product?
Kendall
So, it really depends on the type of project. There are times where a client will come to us and they’re like, we need this two weeks from now. Or, we have this event coming up; we need a brochure or a booklet or something and event’s in two or three weeks. That’s not really the most common; I feel like a lot of the time there is a lot of build-up as far as us gathering information, us like, we’ll do interviews, gain as much information about the project as we can and then even like from that initial meeting to concepting is usually…like a couple week process and then the design, depending on how many rounds that you’re going through can be…weeks, it can be months; it really just depends on the kind of project that you’re on.
Megan
Yeah, definitely, like the scope of the project and also the client. Some clients have a lot of other stuff going on and are going to take longer to get back to you with reviewing things and their revisions and things happen, so projects that maybe you wouldn’t think would take that long do wind up taking long, but then on the other side of that, when you have existing relationships with clients, they’ll come in and be like, oh, we need this web ad, can you turn it around really quick? And since you haven an existing relationship, you know their brand; that stuff can happen pretty much on the fly.
Kelly
Kelly: So, most of the time the client kind of gives you the deadlines and you kind of work within them? Or…
Kendall
Usually, the have a certain date that they need it complete by and then, so we kind of we’ll build the schedule backwards so we know we need a certain amount of time for printing; we know we need a certain amount of time for development and you kinda just, you start from the end date and then you figure out how to make it work within the time that you have.
Gary
How do you know if…how do you get the developer? How do you get their estimate on something that’s that abstract at that point? To work back from.
Kendall
That is a good question but neither Megan or I are really involved in that process.
Megan
I will…I don’t know if you’ll be able to use this, but actually I was freelancing for two years before I took this job and when we would try to…I’ve worked with a couple developers and when we’re kind of like budgeting that stuff out, basically based on past experience, like if you know the scope of the project and you know how much time you have, the developer can look at it and say yes, I can do this; no, I can’t do this; this is what it’s going to take.
Kelly
Kelly: Now, do you guys have a in-house developer or do you out-source?
Kendall
We have a couple different developers that we work with. We don’t have anyone in-house right now, just because our project range is so broad, we don’t really have enough web-based projects to have someone here full time.
Kelly
Kelly: Now, when you’re doing the projects, what programs do you use most often on a day to day basis?
Megan
InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator.
Kendall
OK, so the basics?
Megan
Yeah.
Kelly
Kelly: OK. There’s nothing else besides the normal Adobe ones that you normally reach to?
Megan
I dabble in After Effects.
Kendall
Yeah, I wouldn’t say there’s really any hidden programs in the professional world that we’re using; I think it’s more just figuring out the different things you can do within InDesign and Illustrator. Almost every day I learn something, like new, that I didn’t know you could do in InDesign or something, like a new effect you can create in Illustrator but for the most part it’s the basic programs.
Megan
Yeah, the only other one that comes to mind would be like Sketch or Zepelin or like prototyping tools which I think, I feel like we don’t use that much here but they’re on our radar and people, professionals, use them.
Kelly
Kelly: OK, well that’s good to know, just coming from a student perspective, you don’t want to go right into the industry and be like, oh we’re all using this!
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah, you’re like, whaaat? OK. Now, what habits or skills are good to learn in order to be a successful designer in the business?
Megan
Broad question!
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah, like what are some things that when you were a design student you wish you learned or picked up that was very applicable to the business world?
Kendall
Do you have something that comes to mind?
Megan
Yeah, but not like specific design skills, more just like general…
Kelly
Kelly: Well this is kind of like just general skills or behaviors, like habits…
Megan
Sure, like time management!
Kendall
Yeah, that’s what I was going to say too.
Megan
And also kind of figuring out how to navigate the situation when you don’t know something, like knowing when to put time into figuring it out yourself and when you’re not going to be able to figure it out yourself and you need to ask someone for help or even being able to say, like, I didn’t understand that or I need more direction like learning how to say those things to people and be comfortable with that I think is a pretty big one, like going from school into professional environment where you…
Kelly
Kelly: So, learning to reach out when you need it?
Megan
Right, and to be comfortable with that and not necessarily knowing everything all the time.
Kendall
I think something too that’s huge is in School, your projects are yours and you’re getting feedback from your Professors but it’s not…they’re kind of going at it in a way where they’re just trying to get you to do the best design and working with clients, they have a vision for how they want their company and their brand to be represented and as designers, we’re like, oh we can make this super-badass magazine or annual report that really represents your brand but in a new and cool way and you get really excited about it and you kind of present these concepts that are beautifully designed and you’ll feel really great and passionate about and they come back and they’re like, this isn’t on our brand or this isn’t what we were wanting.
So, something that’s huge that I’ve experienced a lot is just not taking things personally; you don’t sit at your desk and cry about the fact that they didn’t like your concepts, you just have to look at it as they have in mind what they want their brand to look like and how they want their company to be and just kinda have to get on board and look at them as you’re not fighting against the client: you’re a team and you have to figure out a way to still be giving them the best designs that they can get while also representing their vision because it’s not only just your vision, which is kind of how it is in School, you can kind of just do whatever and have good type and layout and grid and all of that but you’re not really dealing with the client’s vision as well.
Lauren
Lauren: Yeah, well we’ve actually had a couple projects in classes where we’ve had to work with clients and some of them fit better with what the client was looking for than others, even though one might have been way better designed overall but I think that’s something that probably comes up a lot, is it?
Gary
That’s for me as an educator. I love the way you phrase that because as an educator right, I’m trying to make…I’m trying to help students make the best work they can. The client is not trying the same thing. Yes, they want the best work but they don’t want it in the same way, so that’s a…that’s something I think educators can actually kind of just put on a different hat a little bit, to critique from the perspective of a client. Yeah, you just made it really clear for me; sorry.
Kelly
Kelly: Like, we want to do the best design but it also has to be what the client wants and what the clients…
Gary
Well, I want to make you a better designer where the client wants to make a better design from their perspective.
Megan
Exactly.
Lauren
Lauren: It’s hard, I think, starting out when you have to be forced to deviate from your own style when your style is still being developed, when you’re in the education process. Like, you don’t necessarily know, this is my thing, this is my niche and having to change that, sorry, for somebody else; it’s hard.
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah, but branching out of your comfort zone to really work within a brand’s field is kind of…it’s difficult to learn as a student but I think educators could do more exercises that involve, let’s say they give an example of a client, the goals and some style references and then maybe every class do a fifteen minute kind of…
Lauren
Lauren: That’s really true. Like I know that when we were with clients it’s really helpful but in other classes, we’ve had projects that weren’t really…like you could tell what the goal was and what skill it was building but it wasn’t necessarily applicable to real world experience and being able to develop that goal that they want us to learn while also, you know, having that experience; I think that would be really…
Megan
Yeah and also kind of pushing you.
Lauren
Lauren: Pushing you along, yeah.
Megan
I was just thinking that like, if there’s, like Kendall said, it’s a really good way to look at it that you and the client are a team together because sometimes it’s really easy to get, even disheartened, but caught up in their push-back or them wanting…
Well and you might think say the option they’re picking or the direction they want to go, you don’t think it’s the best one and there’s like that line between giving the client what they want and at the end of the day it’s their end-product but you’re putting your name on it or the company is putting their name on it so there’s that line between giving them exactly what they want and not giving them something that’s bad design, and so knowing when to push back and when to sort of like…it’s the give and take.
Lauren
Lauren: I guess what I was wondering is, how you go about that communication, especially when they want a certain thing and they think that one element of design is going to help them achieve that thing but really it’s doing the opposite; like they want a modern design but they also want this typeface and that’s like doing the opposite of what they want. How do you go about communicating that?
Megan
Sometimes it’s as simple as just showing them; if you, I mean there’s…you can explain it and you can say this and that but sometimes if you put both of them in front of them and say, this is doing this and this is doing this: we think this one is better and this why, I mean sometimes that’s just the most straightforward way to go about it and we have…our Design Director, Andy, he has been doing this for so long and like you learn how to interact with clients and how to say that to them in a way that they’ll…
Lauren
Lauren: Respectful and…
Megan
Right, that they’ll understand it and that it comes across well and that hopefully they’re seeing your side and then give and take happens and you can…I would, you know, the example that you gave: if someone’s very attached to a certain typeface, that sounds like a really enjoyable client to work with! I’m kidding!
Kelly
Kelly: Now this kinda leads into another question I had, let’s say at a place like this, is there a person who handles the contact with the clients specifically or os the…are the designers talking directly with the client?
Kendall
So, the structure here is Nicolette and Andy who are our Design Directors and they basically lead projects with specific clients; they each kind of have their bucket that they work in as far as their clients and then…so they’re receiving…they’re doing most of the communicating with the client as far as receiving feedback and doing presentations and then they’re kind of like the liaison between the client and the designer so Andy will have a conversation or receive the feedback and everything that the client has to say and then Andy will meet with me or Megan and kind of just give us the run-down of everything.
There are certain clients where the designers are more involved just because over time, if it’s like a bigger project, like one of the magazines that I’m on, I am meeting directly with the client each week just because it makes it a lot easier for that back and forth for something that requires that much communication and just little edits here and there, so there are certain types of projects where you’re in direct communication but for the most part it’s kind of the Directors talk to the client and then the Directors talk to us.
Kelly
Kelly: So if it’s more of an established relationship, it’s more Designer to client whereas if they’re bringing in maybe a new client or the not as familiar then it’s more of the Director to the client?
Kendall
I wouldn’t say it’s based on the extent on the relationship, it’s more just on the type of project.
Megan
Yeah, I would say that her magazine project is more the exception.
Kendall
Yeah, it’s definitely less common for the Designer to be speaking directly with the client. But that’s also just how it is here; I’m not sure how it is at other companies.
Megan
And also after a presentation or if we’re receiving feedback or something, we’ll sit in on a call sometimes and be able to hear the feedback directly from the client but just, I think it makes it easier on the client’s side to not…there are a lot of people on our end working on all the things and for them to have one point of contact that they’re going through and one person organizing all the edits and the feedback and stuff like that, I think it simplifies the process.
Kelly
Kelly: So I kind of answered actually a question from earlier about different job titles and positions so a Design Director would be another job with a person with a design background that is kind of working in the field then?
Megan
But I think that those positions have evolved from Graphic Designer. Like, Andy and Nicolette were both Designers.
Kendall
They started out that and that’s kind of where you can get to.
Megan
Right, and that’d be almost like comparable to a Senior Designer or you know, something like that?
Kendall
You’re kind of just climbing the ladder and Graphic Designer is kind of your entry point and then where you want to go from there is kind of up to you. Some people might not want to be in the Director leadership role because you’re not doing as much hands-on actual designing; it’s a lot more like how you mentioned conceptual thinking and things like that. That’s definitely more in the Director status but if you just love being a Graphic Designer and that’s what you want to do, there are ways to grow in that position as well but it kind of just depends on what your goals are as far as your career.
Gary
Can you talk about that a little bit more? Specifically…I’m thinking about…there are people who just love to just sit there and make buttons. I’m going to say like, UX, UI buttons or just sit there and make layouts and do not care about the…all they care about is the visual and there’s other people who do the strategy. So can you talk a little bit more about those two different kind of options?
Kendall
Yeah, I think speaking about me personally?
Gary
Yeah.
Kendall
So, I’m just a Graphic Designer but I know that me personally, I would love to be in a Director role some day, just because getting to work with Andy and Nicolette and seeing how the conceptualizing works and how it is to interact with clients and be able to also teach younger designers; that’s something that really interests me so I know that that’s something that I want to work towards but I also know that there are people who, like you said, just love designing and they would be perfectly content with that if they could do that forever but I think it comes down a lot to personality types too. Certain people just don’t want to be in leadership roles and that’s not necessarily wrong; it doesn’t mean you don’t want to grow in your career, you don’t care about it, it’s just like that’s your personality and that’s what you know will make you happy, if that answers the question at all. Do you have anything to add about that?
Megan
Yeah, I’m trying to think of…how you’d…like the growth process on just the design side; if you’re really interested in just the visual and I don’t know that that’s…there’s really, that you really stay with just the visual without considering the conceptual. Like I think that if you want to design things forever, you can do that but I think that as you advance, you have to incorporate the conceptual so you could maybe be the person who does both. Like I’m thinking about the architecture of this thing and the system and how it makes sense and then also doing it and designing it but I don’t…I just, for the span of your career, taking conceptual direction from someone else, I feel like that isn’t giving you much room for growth.
Kendall
Yeah, or maybe you go from a situation where you’re a designer in a position where you have Directors who are kind of guiding the projects and then you maybe work your way to a company where you’re the sole designer so you are making those decisions; you’re not necessarily directing other Designers but you’re kind of like directing yourself and you’re making the decisions for yourself in the designs…
Megan
Yeah, I mean like I feel if you’re taking away that sort of conceptual decision-making process, it’s almost like being an Illustrator…because even if you just want to sit and make buttons and you like making attractive buttons, that’s great but even though we’re not Design Directors, we’re still taking in the system and all these conceptual rules and all of these things and I feel like that grows as you keep doing it. Did that make sense at all? I don’t know.
Lauren
Lauren: Yeah it did.
Lauren
Lauren: OK, so, what I was wondering is about some of the annual projects and how that works, I don’t know if any of you worked on one? I know that that was a thing but I guess I just want to know, do you keep in contact with the Company throughout the year to maintain an understanding of their developing content or is it like a yearly meeting that you do?
Kendall
Hmm, that’s a good question. So, for one, for example, so I’ve been the Lead Designer for the past two years for the annual report that we’ve done and it’s kind of like you have an understanding where they come to us in October or September and they’re like, all right, we’re ready to kick off the Annual Report: here’s where our brand’s at, here’s what’s happened over the past year, here’s what we’re envisioning. Let’s see what we can do with that. So, something that was really cool that happened with one was they used to have this really down-and-dirty, on the ground super-textured, super-organic style for their design and this year they came to us and they were like, based on how this past year has been with the political environment and just where we see our brand going, we want to do something that’s completely different.
So for the years up to that they were kind of developing their brand further and further into this really rugged and in-the-ground kind of brand and then this year they were like, we want something completely new, super-clean, black and white; let’s run with it. So it’s kind of like when they come to you, they already kind of have in mind, because they were experiencing it obviously, so they already kind of have in mind what they’re envisioning for this year. Sometimes it’s the same as what it’s been in the past and sometimes it’s different, it’s kinda just depends on the company and the environment of the year and…I don’t know if that answers your question?
Lauren
Lauren: OK, so, how do you identify the traits that are most essential to the brand, like in the interview process, that you want to emphasize to better their business?
Kelly
Kelly: Are you talking about when you’re doing a branding project?
Lauren
Lauren: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly
Kelly: Or like just a project in general?
Lauren
Lauren: So, like…yeah, like in a branding project specifically. Like, when you’re talking to them, how do they point that out to you? How do they identify the traits that they want you to show up the most?
Kendall
So, in the past, as designers we’re not really part of the discovery process but Aaron and Andy and Nicolette and whoever’s on the project, they’ll go and they’ll have interviews with everyone; everyone that kind of like plays a significant role in the brand or in the company. Even people who have nothing to do with design or marketing or anything but have been with the company for a long time and just really understand how the company appears to the outside world and how their audience is and everything like that; they’ll go and they’ll just talk to them, really about the company and get a feel for it.
Is it a super-high-end luxurious brand? Is it something that they want to appeal to the everyday person, so they’ll just conduct interviews and they’ll talk to all these different people for hours and hours, and then they kind of come back and the collect…they see where there’s overlap between people and see, they kind of find the common theme and the common traits that were used to describe the company and then we kind of just roll from there.
Kelly
Kelly: So you kind of do your own background research and not just letting the client tell you what they think?
Kendall
Yeah.
Kelly
Kelly: Specifically from one source, you kind of do like your…
Kendall
You talk to them in like the broader way, so you don’t talk to them like, well, what do you want your logo to look like? Or, what colors do you think represent your company? You kind of go at it as, you get a really good understanding for the company as a whole and everything they stand for and all their values and their products and everything that really makes the company who they are and then you figure out a way to either develop their brand, their existing brand more towards something that aligns with their vision or you just are starting completely from scratch based on the things that you understand about the company.
Megan
Right; there are going to be things like their audience and their company and all of these things that go into it and I just think in general, non-designers and designers’ idea of what a brand is, is going to be a little bit different. So the client is obviously going to tell you, these are our core values and these things that we’re thinking about and what’s important to them and stuff like that but then like Kendall said, in this broad view, there are things that as a Designer, you would probably hone in on that is like kind of beyond what…so I think it’s a little bit of both; both of the things that you said: yes, having the client tell you what their brand is to them but then also all of the digging beyond that.
Kelly
Kelly: So kind of finding the key words that give a direction as a Designer just to kind of dive in?
Kendall
Yeah, and you’ll have people who are like, well my favorite color is blue so I want blue to be part of our brand. And you’re like…OK, we can do that but let’s figure out a meaning, let’s figure out the reason for this blue or; color represents something more than just, oh, well I like blue. We had this one client where his favorite color was lime green and it really did not have anything to do with their brand at all but they were so set on this lime green and so we kind of just had to be like, all right, how can we make this make sense for their brand. So you will have times where you’re getting direct design direction but then other times there’ll be people who’ll tell you a story of when he was interning at the company twenty years ago and why he still works there, so it’s like, it’s really, it just depends on the kind of people and the opinions and some companies totally trust you as the expert and some companies want more hands on, want to be more hands on in the process, so it really just depends.
Megan
Yeah, and there are also, like as a freelancer when you’re kind of like interacting with these people one on one, you’ll get something like people tell you what they like and what they don’t like and it’s a little bit harder to have those conversations because you don’t have the weight of an agency behind you but one of the things that I read somewhere and found really useful is trying to steer it in terms of, well how does this serve the goal or accomplish the goal? Not do you like it, do you like blue, is it your favorite color but like how is this serving this common goal that we’ve established in evaluating things in that way and kind of like framing questions in that way because the responsibility falls on the designer who’s doing the research to ask questions, the right questions in the right way to get answers that are useful to you.
Lauren
Lauren: OK, so I had an internship experience; I don’t know if you’ll be able to speak on this because it’s kind of a specific experience, but we’ll see. So, at this company, the direction of the company itself was kind of unclear which meant that the direction for the logo design itself was unclear and so this was a major concern that we faced and it ended up we didn’t complete the logo because it was so unclear. So, do you have any advice on how to approach that situation and understanding more facility in that conversation?
Megan
So there was a logo for a company that didn’t know what it was doing?
Lauren
Lauren: No, OK, so there was an original logo; they didn’t know anything about the history behind it, they didn’t know anything…it was kind of a start-up, they only had a few people working for them and they didn’t have a clear idea on what they wanted to do. It was…they knew it was a security company, of course; they knew what they were doing but they didn’t know what the direction of the logo…they didn’t know what they wanted to represent, that’s what I’m trying to say, does that make sense?
Megan
I don’t know. I think in situations like that, maybe you just have to take some risks and show them maybe two completely different ends of the spectrum and see what people react to. I don’t know. I mean, maybe that’s the time where you as a Designer say, well, this is what I think we should do; this is what I think makes the most sense for the direction that we want to go. Sell yourself as the expert and make some design decisions and explain why you think that it’s valid and people will either react positively and then you move forward or if they react negatively, you know what they’re not looking for. Sometimes a huge thing is showing clients what they don’t want, so that way it kind of helps them figure out what they do want.
So if they’re responding to thinks and they’re like, oh, I don’t like that. So you know, OK, maybe let’s try something that’s the complete opposite of that and see how they respond to that. So, it can be a little bit of a painful process but I think it’s a good discovery opportunity to see, because some people have trouble visualizing things too and as the Designers, we can…you and I can have a conversation back and forth and figure out what a logo would look like without even having to sketch it but a lot of people can’t think visually that way so a lot of the times I think it is you just show them either what they do want and what they don’t want and you kind of just keep moving and evolving from there.
Kelly
Kelly: It’s really funny because it’s just…it sounds really familiar because that’s…reminds me of what I do at my job even though it’s completely different thing. I’m a retail manager and I work at a boutique store and a lot of the time we have special occasion shoppers, I know this is kind of off-topic, but they’ll come in and they’re like, OK, I need an outfit for a wedding and I’ll be like…and they have no idea what they want to wear, like no direction. We kind of ask them guiding questions first like, is it casual, is it elegant, and then what fit and they don’t know, I’ll show them two different outfits and like, what do you like about this, what do you not like about this and kind of hone in on what they’re saying to actually guide anew what they actually want if they don’t know what they want. I know, completely different…
Megan
The process sounds really similar!
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah, this is like literally I’m just like, am I at work now? What is this?
Kendall
Because even if people don’t know what they want, people will definitely tell you what they do not like and that at least gives you something to go on, based on that.
Kelly
Kelly: Yeah, you can tell!
Kendall
Even if they’re not saying it, you can look at someone’s face and see whether or not their eyes are lighting up and love it or they’re totally confused and hate it. You can definitely tell by reading people. Even just that first glance.
Gary
I think that’s one you kind of have to go through. I mean, you went through it but I went through the same thing where I was working on, designing a logo for a mental health firm and I was just starting out and so I totally mis-managed that; I just like, well here’s this, here’s that, here’s this, here’s that, here’s this, here’s that and ended up not going with anything but then some other firm came in and just did a simple little logo type with the initials and they ran with that and it wasn’t anything exciting but because they knew how to direct the client, that’…that’s what he went with.
Kendall
Looking back I would do so many different things, it’s crazy!
Lauren
Lauren: OK, so I have one more question but I’m pretty sure we already established it several times; I don’t know what you think, but how do you go about engaging with customers to get a better understanding of the brand you’re designing for?
Gary
I think just like more…can you be more a little more…you talked about it, but what does the physical process look like?
Kendall
As far as…
Lauren
Lauren: How do you go about engaging with customers to get a better understanding of the brand you’re designing for?
Gary
So, like, what does that meeting look like, kind of when you sit down with them, when you’re trying to fish all this information out from them?
Megan
Yeah, so I mean, Kendall said it before, as designers, we’re not really directly involved in that process here. I mean, my branding experience is with my freelance clients who’ve been kind of a nightmare due to really short deadlines and so the process is…has been, I don’t know, not how I would do it ever again!
Kendall
I think as far as working with an existing brand you kind of just do your research and see what they’ve done in the past and kind of just build on that. A lot of big companies will have brand guides; some are super-specific and have really strict rules and others are like, well here’s some logos or here’s some colors and some type and kind of just have a free-for-all, so I think it’s just doing your research and kind of seeing the strictness of the brand and also just what they’ve done in the past and also, like hope I spoke to one just, the climate of the company and how they’re feeling about that year or what’s going on and how, kind of how they want to portray themselves.
Kelly
Kelly: Now, I have kind of a larger question; it’s a little bit more specific to you as individuals. What would you say is the most important thing that a design student should know when coming into the business? What’s the first thing that pops to your head, like, I wish I knew this.
Megan
I guess one of the things that immediately comes to mind is just, as design students you’re probably already getting this, I don’t know if it’s like walking in being like, oh I wish I had this but just getting really comfortable with criticism and learning how to use it constructively and not take it personally and like Kendall touched on it a little bit earlier; not getting married to like a concept or a design so that you’re going to be…that you are like resisting moving away from it, those kinds of things I think are really important.
Kelly
Kelly: Is there anything else that was kind of like a big slap to the face when you like first started?
Kendall
Well, I think the biggest thing for me, it’s kinda funny; I feel like we joke about this, but when you’re in school you’re like, this is going to be so awesome; this is going to be…I going to try…as positive possible…
Megan
We do: we talk about it all the time!
Kendall
So you’re like, oh yeah, design, I’m going to be in the creative industry, it’s going to be so fun; we’re going to be super-creative and doing these really cool brainstorms every day and it’s going to be the most fun job ever. At the end of the day, it’s a nine to five or a nine to ten or whatever situation you’re in. It’s a job and you kind of have to understand that jobs aren’t always going to be the most fun but that you have to figure out a way to remember why you chose design I the first place and why you chose this industry in the first place, so you kinda have to make it…like the creative fun job that you want it to be while also understanding that it really is a job and it’s just…
Megan
Right, like, sometimes the client’s going to pick the worst option or…your day is going to suck.
Kendall
And you kind of just have to put your head down and do it, yeah. I think that was like the biggest thing for me; even just going from internship here to full time designer; as interns you’re a little bit guarded and you’re on the more fun projects and you get to be more creative and then eventually when you’re full time they’re like, all right, we need these twenty different direct mail pieces and they’re all going to pretty much look the exact same and you’re going to be working on this for the next three weeks and you’re like, OK, that’s fine, just gotta take in and run with it and do the best you can and take the opportunity when you are getting the really fun creative projects to really let that kind of fill up your cup because you know you’re going to have stuff that just completely drains you and makes you forget why you even wanted to be a designer in the first place so I think that was the biggest thing for me.
Megan
This is not or big or good as what Kendall just said, but my other sort of piece of advice; my under-grad degree was in English, Creative Writing and I cannot tell you how many times potential employers or clients, whoever, are like, so impressed and thrilled to find someone who has writing skills and so even if it’s like through the avenue of learning to write and speak about your work, like developing some good solid communications skills will come, it will be so indispensable, whether it’s in communicating with clients or presenting work or just being able to talk about your work or being able to, you know what? I can whip up some copy for that, whatever it is, developing some good writing skills that you can put on your résumé and whip out is huge.
Kendall
Or even email etiquette, which is something that you don’t think about but all of our communication with our clients for the most part is through email and knowing the difference between there, they’re and their and things like that are huge. It’s little things like that, that as a designer, you’re like, oh I’m a creative, I don’t have to have the best grammar in the world or I don’t have to be able to communicate the most clearly but at the end of the day, like Megan was saying: communication is huge, regardless of the industry that you’re in.
Megan
Yeah, and I mean even like if you have the best design ever, if you can’t explain why it’s good or if you can’t communicate about it, even like you said, if you can’t speak with your client or you can’t direct them in the right way or you can’t sell it, the design of it is only half of it when in the real world that a real job where you have to convince someone to use your work; it’s a good skill.
Kendall
Or if there’s a word spelled wrong on a presentation and someone notices. That is all they’re going to look at and that is all they’re going to think about the entire time, so it’s little things like that, that are just super-important that you won’t think necessarily are.
Gary
Yeah, I did that. I didn’t even do it; I took a quote from somebody who mis-spelled something in their quote and I didn’t check their quote to put the little sic after it to say like, this was a direct quote, and that’s all they talked about. It was like…ooohhh…
Kendall
They won’t even remember…
Megan
And you want to be like, I’m so detail-oriented I promise I didn’t mean it.
Kendall
They’re not going to believe it.
Megan
You can’t take it back, once your typo’s out into the world.
Kendall
As an intern, I had a lot of …lack of spell-check situations.
Megan
And it’s so embarrassing!.
Kendall
So now I will spell-check everything five times before I even sent it to a director to review because when you’re typing just like things happen so it’s just like little things like that, that you learn as you go. Learn from your mistakes.
Kelly
Kelly: So a healthy amount of paranoia!
Kendall
I wouldn’t say paranoia but attention to detail and just taking your time and not rushing through things and…it’s huge just to learn from your mistakes because if you’re continuously doing the same thing…
Megan
Yeah, you make the same mistake over and over again; that’s going to be really frustrating to the people that you work with.
Kendall
But it’s OK to make mistakes.
Megan
Yes, but not the same mistakes over and over again.
Kendall
Exactly. That’s what we have the Directors for. It’s great because they’re kind of…a little bit of a protection…
Megan
Right, multiple eyes on everything before it goes anywhere…
Kendall
Yeah, because you know that they’re going to be looking at that before it goes to print but I’ve made some mistakes where it’s made it to development or it’s made it to print and you feel like complete crap but you know for future, you know you’re going to check that pdf five more times and you’re going to spell-check ten more times or just things like that, so it’s really just learning from your mistakes and being able to grow and understanding you are human and you don’t have to be perfect; it’s OK to make mistakes but just be able to learn from them and not continuously make the same mistakes over and over again.
Gary
Do you have any sage advice you want to offer that we didn’t cover?
Kendall
I mean, all I would say is that internships are huge. I am such a big advocate for internships and it’s like, when I was in School I was like, OK, yeah, we get it; internships are important, but the amount that I’ve learned through my experience here as an intern and also I interned at Towson in their Creative Services department, just getting that experience in the professional world before you really go into it as an entry level designer is huge because it’ll make you feel more confident because you know that you are used to working in a more professional environment but it also makes people more confident in your abilities as well, so I’m a huge advocate for internships. As I’m sure most educators are!
Gary
Yes, definitely. So, these two are going to ask the follow-up question: how do you find internships?
Kendall
How do you find internships? That’s a good question. I know through Towson, through your career center, I’m sure UMBC has somewhere; also just all of the AIGA networking events that you can go do; just figure ways to get out into the industry and it’s like now you know me and Megan so you’re more than welcome to reach out to us about any questions that you have or just make connections as much as you can and really go that extra mile to go to different events and be able to talk to people and your Professors too; they’re a great resource because I know a lot of my Professors were also working professionals at agencies or companies and so they kind of know what’s going on too. I got my first internship because one of my Professors recommended me for it so really just develop as much relationships as you can with professionals in the field while you’re in School I think is a huge help.
Gary
All right, I have one follow-up question for Kelly; you inadvertently stumbled upon something that I’ve been thinking about for a long time a while back and that is about those quick fifteen minute exercises. So, the reason being, I’m bringing this back up, is like typography. Every single program across the country has one, two or three levels, sometimes even four levels of typography. But we generally have one, maybe two courses that are web-related and that’s it. So, what would be like…and so I was recently talking to other educators like, OMG what would do if we did get a second web design class and we all came back to it like, we would want quick, short exercises. And so you mentioned like a quick, short exercise that maybe it was based on the…like an outcome, like a Key Performance Indicator or something like that, so do you want to talk more about what you were thinking and…I’ll let you describe it first.
Kelly
Kelly: I was kind of thinking along the lines of…In my typography class this semester, we kind of, for a couple of classes we just had kind of like a company idea kind of just a kind of a goal and a direction and then we had to mock-up kind of really quickly, let’s say it was the front of a mobile app or it was business letterhead or it was a poster, something along those lines, so just kind of being able to quickly work in that or even what you’re saying, even with the digital kind of more web-based design, being able to kind of mock-up maybe the front page of a website really quickly, even if it was just kind of just doing kind of color schemes or typography, just kind of getting more exercise of dealing with what a client’s expectations are and broadening our design ideas because I feel like a lot of the time students, when we’re just kind of developing an idea, let’s say we do a project for a class and it goes really well and everyone likes it, you’re like, oh yes, this turned out great and then you find yourself for the next couple of projects doing something in that same vein of style, I feel like sometimes as a design student, once we feel comfortable in something we’ll get stuck in it and kind of being pushed in other directions and other styles is I think would be really helpful.
Megan
The thing that this brings to mind, so I took a web design class in Grad School that I was pretty excited…it was a Level 2 web design and it was terrible: I literally didn’t learn anything; I kind of…it just wasn’t very good so after coming out of School I was like, well, this was supposed to give me digital skills that now I feel like I don’t have and one of the things that I came across and I can’t remember exactly what it was but I can find it was like a website called DailyUI and it emails you every day a UI design prompt and it’s…I think it goes for like a hundred days or something like that. I didn’t do a hundred days of it but I was like, this is awesome because it’s also…you can kind of stick some of those in your portfolio if you like them and round them out but I think that that sort of speaks to this quick…here’s a prompt, let’s solve it and every time you solve it you’re getting a little bit better at doing it, whether it’s, maybe sometimes it’s just a wireframe and maybe sometimes it’s high-fidelity and yeah, I think that that’s, for me at least, it was really much more useful than the web design class that I took.
Gary
I think that’s what was missing because I’ve known about the DailyUI and I’ve always wanted to do it but I felt like it’s…I like the idea of where you said, there’s a purpose to it. So DailyUI you design a profile card…
Megan
It’s like a prompt, yeah.
Gary
I would like to say you design a profile card that increases the visibility of X, whatever that is, and I think that’s what is missing from the DailyUI in my mind that you, when you said it, it popped up as…
Megan
I think the end goal of the Daily UI also at the end of the day is probably to make pretty interfaces, which is not the goal of designing.
Gary
It’s still good exercise though, it’s still hugely…everybody should be doing.
Megan
Like learning to design with a purpose. </dl>